Brainstorm early and as often as possible is Post #5 in a series from a presentation entitled 11 Great Creative Slip-Ups: The Most Common Mistakes in Brainstorming. The introduction to the series begins here.
The Problem: More time is spent on strategy than creativity
It’s always with a mix of amusement and frustration that I witness so much time spent by people buzzing and fretting over the strategic elements of a program, but giving little time and resources to coming up with the best solutions to literally solve the inherent problems which may prevent the program’s positive conclusion.
Perhaps it’s my skewed perspective, but I’ve rarely seen a new business presentation succeed because it had a bang-on strategy but a mediocre idea.
Don’t get me wrong. Strategy is very important. It anchors the direction of the program. It links the tactics to the overall mission. It identifies the key issues to address and the opportunities to leverage. It analyzes the target audience to uncover the insight. It traffics resources so they’re used wisely.
But strategy does not create the idea. That’s creativity.
At the very least, from receiving the initial request for ideas to submitting the final proposal, shouldn’t at least half of the time be spent on creativity?
(And if not, doesn’t also make sense to start brainstorming early? But I’m getting ahead of myself.)
The Brilliance of Sturgeon's Law
In 1957, science fiction author Theodore Sturgeon coined one of my all-time favourite business quotes in a book review.
“Ninety percent of everything is crap.”
I’ve heard it referred to as the 90-10 Rule, but it’s all the same perspective. This law governs every single brainstorm, formal or otherwise.
For every 10 ideas created, nine will be boring, illegal, illogical, immoral, illicit, undo-able, repetitive, ho-hum, or unworkable.
BUT, one idea in ten will be fantastic, thrilling, sensational and every other good thing.
To make this principle work in your favour, you need to generate as many ideas as possible. By increasing the 90% of bad ideas, you exponentially increase the 10% good ideas.
From Alex Osborn: “Time after time we have said that ideas should be regarded as ore. Ore has to be refined into maximum value. Our average yield is less than 10 usable ideas per 100 produced. Is that so bad? In gold mining, it takes nearly 200,000 ounces of ore to produce one ounce of gold. And it takes 6,000,000 blossoms to produce a pound of honey.”
If you don’t have time to generate a significant amount of ideas in a single brainstorm, you need to …
1. Brainstorm earlier
2. Brainstorm more often
The Solution: Brainstorm early and as often as possible
Here are four suggestions.
1. Start brainstorming as soon as possible.
Most leaders get the team together at the beginning of a program, proposal or pitch to review the high-level strategic elements, such as the business goals and outcomes, debate prospective strategies, determine the research needed, and assign responsibiltiies.
There’s no reason why you can’t also start brainstorming as soon as possible after the intiail meetings or discussions.
Here’s the catch. Brainstorm but DO NOT select the idea.
- You haven’t had enough time, background or thought to select one over another.
- It’s likely in the first session or two, you don’t have the best idea yet anyway.
- As you jump in, you wouldn’t have given much consideration to wha criteriat you’re going to use to choose the best idea.
- All creativity needs a bit of incubation time. Some deeper thinking time (subconscious/unconscious thinking) is never a bad idea. But it’s best to get it started early!
At the same time, you don’t want to limit creativity. Here’s some ways to get started using this suggestion.
- Get your “creatives” together quickly, skip the formalities.
- Brain dump. Write everything down, publicly if possible.
- Tell the office. Post the skeleton of the project, goal, problem and potential thought starters. I do it ‘old school’ by hanging a flipshart in a high-traffic location. I’ve asked people to come find me or email me their suggestions.
- As another option, you might consider brainstorming in small groups for 15 minutes every day. Save everything, even the bad ideas. Think of the bad ideas as filling up the 90% so it’s easier to find the good 10%!
2. More and smaller brainstorms tend to be more effective.
I’m not against big, full-tilt brainstorms. But they’re often more work than effective. And, if you’re a smaller office, you also don’t want to burn out everyone at the beginning. Or go back to the well over and over to the same people for the same assignment.
I find smaller groups ideal: a leader or facilitator, plus 2-3 others. We meet quickly. I give just enough information to be dangerous. We might do a quick ice-breaker to get people in the right mind-frame. We talk, I write. 10-15 minutes, tops. I thank them, they go away. Another team arrives, and lather, rinse and repeat.
If a new team comes in, I might start with an intriguing idea rather than start from the beginning. That’s good if you don’t have many people, so if you DO need to return to the same creative minds, at least you’re giving them something new to play with and be creative.
One thing I’ve learnt: it’s sometimes hard to get people to attend brainstorms because the meeting doesn’t fit into their schedule. So, a friend creates a sign-up sheet for specific blocks of time so people can sign-up for whatever time of day they may be free.
3. Keep the ideas public.
This point is as creative as it is strategic.
I like keeping creativity out in full-view.
All staff or team members need a gentle reminder that everyone can think creatively and should contribute to the creativity of the organisation. And, while they may not consider themselves creative in a stereotypical way, everyone has the ability to think creatively in their own way.
By keeping the ideas and notes out in the open, it’s a reminder that creative ideas can come from anywhere. Once, I had a client who came through our kitchen/canteen where I’d posted the brainstorm flipcharts. She saw how anyone could contribute to the ideas to help her problems.
I also don’t care where or when people think of their ideas. I only care that they tell me about them so we can add them to the other ideas.
As a final point, if you want to build a creative culture, you must make creativity a daily action. It needs to be inclusive, engaging and demonstrative. Use brainstorming early and often is a way to encourage curiosity, entrepreneurship and innovation.
How else have you planned or organised brainstorming early to help the creative process? Please add your thoughts and comments below.
If you want to return to the original article with links to the other ‘Slip-Ups’, click here.
2 Comments
Love this….
Thanks Liz. Good to hear from you, and glad you enjoyed it.